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We’re a New Company

19. May 2005 | Category Rant, Technology

That’s the line I was given after successfully canceling my account with the ‘newest’ DVD rent-by-mail, powerhouse Blockbuster, and asked why it was so difficult to get onto the website.

It seems the 800 poung gorilla that has sat quietly in the corner while all the others were raking in cash has finally come to the realization it should jump in on this fad, lest the competition undermine their cash cow operations and make them irrevelant. I’m somewhat glad for it, as it has brought down prices at Walmart and Netflix. Capitalism works good that way.

Now that Blockbuster has made it’s play though, I’m starting to wonder if it was worthwhile to put the worst foot forward into such a sizzling competitve and fickle market. I decided to join after seeing their ads plastered all over USATODAY offering a free month of renting. Sounds easy enough. I’ve done it with both rivals and it worked flawlessly.

But Blockbuster can’t even figure out how to let you sign into their website for the rental program. After seeming logging in and giving them your credit card info, you think you’re all set to go. But nope, you can’t. Seems they don’t think you logged in and want you to do it all over again. So I read through FAQs and maybe there is a cookie problem. So I follow the advice and clear cookies in both Mozilla and IE. nothing. Try different computer, same thing, nothing. After putzing a good hour on this, I call up Customer Service and cancel accounts. And for all this they can say they’re a new company. What, did they just steal Blockbuster’s trademarks and create all the buzz in the industry after doing so? I think not.

I am less than impressed with their stupidity, both online and in-person customer service. Get with it.

**UPDATE — while researching links to Walmart’s service, it appears that Walmart has conceded defeat of their service and is pushing it’s users to Netflix. Interesting.

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Where’d George (or Alexander) go?

16. May 2005 | Category Interests, Technology

A while back, I found a website that you use to track US currency via the site and the unique serial number on currency. This was interesting to me, because as a kid I wondered what actually happened to money after it left your hands, the places it might go and things that it could be part of.

So upon hearing about this site, I signed up and entered in a few bills of various currencies and disseminated them out into the world. The first one I received information on didn’t travel far, Fergus Falls, or have any other information entered with it. But the second one,a Alexander Hamilton, upon which I just recieved notification, has traveled all the way to Anchorage, AK , which is awesome and very cool in a way.

The site tracks distance from report A to report B and also miles traveled per day, which with the Alaska Bill was on average of some 6.2 miles/day which is quite good I think.

All in all, it was fun to learn of this. Ah, the joys the internet can bring mankind!

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Keeps on Ticking

7. May 2005 | Category Observations, Personal

For joy!

I have once again found a watch that I had purchased shortly after I began college in 1998. This might not be a big thing, but this particular watch has been lost a few times on my part since then and I have always found it again. I’ve had to replace the band. This all for a cheap $10 timepiece from Walmart.

But what is more odd/interesting is that the watch still has the same battery it had when I bought it. I think that’s a record of some sort. Close to 7 years on the same battery? Yeah, pretty remarkable. No, it isn’t a solar watch either. It’s only acts up a bit once in a while when it gets wet, which is dumb, because it sports a “water resistance” to 30 meters, but I highly doubt that would work real well now.

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Lifestory People

6. May 2005 | Category Personal

Within the last few days I have heard about a man that is so desperate to talk to anyone that within minutes of first meeting him, you would know his whole life story and why he is the way he is. It’s not that bad that someone would be that open and willing to talk to you, but having to tell you their whole life story or the personal highlights/lowlights wiithout your asking when you first meet them just reeks of desperation and somewhat sad in and of itself.

Having personally met a few of these types, this behavior just strikes me as odd. My first encounter with such a person was when I was first fitted for glasses in college. Having picked out a eye doctor at random, I choose Sears Optical in Mankato. It was a bad luck of the draw on my part, but needing the glasses more than the doctor, I forged ahead. During the usual chit-chat with the doctor, I told him I attended MSU. Harmless enough you may think? Not really. I next recieved a lecture about this idiot doctor’s life story. About how his dad had died when he was young and he had to pay his whole way through college and med school to become the eye doctor he was today. How did this affect my life? Just because I had student loans I was a bad person and didn’t conform to his path in life? Fuck that. I didn’t care what had happened to him or how his life came about. Give me the service I want and if I ask for life stories, then you may feel obliged to tell me. Good grief. This idiot’s name was Dr. Dull. I laugh because I think his life is ‘dull’ if he had to harp to me about it. So now I tell people to avoid him and Sears Optical like the plague, but I’ve known of a few unfortunate individuals that have gone there after me and had similar subpar experiences. Sad.

The other individual I’ve heard a similar sob story from was a man known to me for quite some time, being a neighbor. Even though I knew him, having not asked to hear a rendition of his life story got him lumped into the same boat as forementioned. This guy had his hand supposedly torren down to the bone on one hand in a hay baler mishap and that hand, although still intact and functional, had caused him a lifetime of pain, which I hadn’t known about until he told me. This came shortly after he had a very severe bacterial infection in his lungs, which forced him out of full-time employment, which may have added to his pity party and it’s description of the pain in his life. But no one had asked to hear it, so it made you feel uneasy and ponder why you had to bear witness to such information.

These people have gone on to lead what appears to be successful lives, but I somewhat believe they have a deeper problem which just manifests itself in their stories about their lives and problems to those they interact with. I will be highly suspicious of such people in the future,for the experiences I’ve had with such pople in the past.

Although people too, are suprised about what you can tell them when they ask you a question about your life that not many would know or care about, having never realized that it had/could have happened to you. But at least they asked you, you didn’t broadcast it to them.

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Horse Burgers…. yum, yum

5. May 2005 | Category Rant

What are horses good for?

You can’t really eat them, unless you’re into that culturally. They don’t have wool or fleece that you could shear off. All they do is eat enoromous quantities of food, get out often and let you ride them if they let you.

Some people make oodles of money racing them or breeding them together to make more of these dasterdly animals. Everyone that lives near the cities or comes from the cities thinks that horses are what define a farm, when all they do is make a mockery out of farming itself, raising prices for everything horse related that could be put to better use on a beef or dairy farm.

And there’s a lot to be said about women that like horses, nothing too positive.

All I can figure horses are good for is glue. If you can’t tell, I don’t like horses much.

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